Social Media

ImageLooop Creates MySpace Layout API

ImageLooop is a slideshow provider with a product almost identical to Slide.com, MySpace slideshows, RockYou and FilmLoop. Today they tried to step up their efforts by announcing a "MySpace Layout Auto-Embed API". The idea is that users can visit your MySpace layouts site, enter their username and password and instantly have that layout appear on their MySpace page without cutting and pasting code snippets. I've seen sites that already do this, but presumably the aim is to make life easy for developers who don't have the time to figure it all out.

The API is free, but there's a catch: the users will automatically have an ImageLooop slideshow posted to their page. This might be a high price to pay: automatically adding a link back to ImageLooop might be tolerable, but an entire slideshow seems over the top. They might also want to charge a few dollars per month for those developers who don't want the ImageLooop slideshow to hitch a ride. Another slight issue: do users trust the MySpace layout sites enough to enter their usernames and passwords? Slide.com already offers both codes and the password option, so I'd be interested to know which one visitors use most frequently.

I like the idea of making MySpace more digestible for developers, but it remains to be seen whether they take to the API idea. Quite frankly, you've got to wonder why MySpace themselves haven't created an equivalent of the Facebook API - perhaps because Facebook wants to encourage legitimate development, while MySpace is less enthusiastic about its own ecosystem? Or perhaps TheSpringBox will provide a platform for legitimate developers?

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